These 10 TV Pilots Are All-Time Greats — and We Ranked Them
Some TV shows were great right from the start with their killer pilot episodes, as seen in series like Game of Thrones and Mad Men.
In the world of television, a pilot episode is essentially the series premiere. It not only serves as an introduction to the series, but also as a means of testing the waters, with the showrunners using it to gauge viewers' interest in the show. Odds are, if your pilot episode sucks, the rest of the series is going to be less than stellar, to put it mildly, so it's really important to nail the pilot. Sometimes, the pilots end up being the best episodes, especially in the case of sitcoms, which tend to expend all of their best jokes in the first episode in the hopes that they can attract viewers to the rest of the series, which might not be as funny.
